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Progress Monitoring

Progress monitoring is used to assess students’ academic performance, to quantify a student rate of improvement or responsiveness to instruction, and to evaluate the effectiveness of instruction. Progress monitoring can be implemented with individual students or an entire class.

In progress monitoring, attention should focus on fidelity of implementation and selection of evidence-based tools, with consideration for cultural and linguistic responsiveness and recognition of student strengths.

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Center Resources

This resource provides a definition of RTI, reviews essential RTI components (screening, progress monitoring, the multi-level prevention system, and data-based decision making), and responds to frequently asked questions about implementing RTI. This document lays out four essential components of RTI: a school-wide, multi-level instructional and behavioral system for preventing school failure; screening; progress monitoring; and data-based decision making for instruction, movement within the multi-level system, and disability identification (in accordance with state law).

This learning module focuses on the types of assessments that are commonly used within an RTI framework. It differentiates between summative, formative, and diagnostic assessments as well as norm-referenced and criterion-referenced assessments and discusses the primary use for each of these assessments. It also provides a more in depth look at formative assessments, including mastery measures and general outcome measures.

This learning module focuses on the steps needed to effectively utilize progress monitoring data in the decision making process. It provides information, examples, and activities to learn about the progress monitoring process.

This learning modules provides an overview of progress monitoring and considerations for implementing progress monitoring in a district or school. It provides an overview of the purpose, focus, tools, and timeframe of progress monitoring and a demonstration of the progress monitoring tools chart.

This learning module focuses on developing a basic understanding of response to intervention (RTI) and the essential components of an RTI model. It provides the Centers definition of RTI and an overview of screening, progress monitoring, multi-level prevention system, and data-based decision making.

In this webinar, Dr. John Hosp, Associate Professor in the Department of Teaching and Learning at the University of Iowa and member of the Center's technical review committee for screening tools, shares rubrics for evaluating screening and progress tools and describes the process used by the Iowa Department of Education to apply these rubrics.

This series of briefs on progress monitoring comprises four separate documents. The purpose of these progress monitoring briefs is to provide practitioners with guidance to support careful planning and thoughtful practices as part of comprehensive progress monitoring within the Response to Intervention (RTI) framework. The briefs are useful to schools just beginning the RTI process as well as those that have the RTI framework well established but need a quick check to evaluate their processes.

The Progress Monitoring Tools Chart is designed to assist educators and families in becoming informed consumers who can select progress monitoring tools that best meet their individual needs. The Center's Technical Review Committee (TRC) on Progress Monitoring independently established a set of criteria for evaluating the scientific rigor of progress monitoring tools. The TRC rated each submitted tool against these criteria but did not compare it to other tools on the chart.

In this webinar, Dr. Julie Esparza Brown, Dr. Amanda Sanford, and Erin Lolich focus on improving educational outcomes for English Language Learners (ELLs) through culturally and linguistically responsive implementation of an RTI framework in the area of elementary reading. Specifically, it discusses critical considerations to appropriately utilize screening and progress monitoring data with ELL students to improve reading outcomes by addressing the factors that influence ELL students' academic success. The webinar includes recommendations for the appropriate selection and use of screening and progress monitoring data based on students' unique backgrounds and needs and uses a case study to illustrate these recommendations with a first grade ELL student.

This brief provides a framework for using Response to Intervention (RTI) with students who are English Language Learners (ELLs) from Hispanic backgrounds. It examines the characteristics of these students, defines the RTI process, and then models how students’ linguistic, cultural, and experiential backgrounds can guide appropriate screening, progress monitoring, and goal setting that will help promote English literacy. The brief concludes with a case study that provides specific recommendations for how to apply screening and progress monitoring with ELLs. The accompanying placemat was developed to provide an overview of specific considerations for ELLs when implementing the four essential components of a RTI framework.

The RTI Implementer Series Module 2: Progress Monitoring focuses on the essential components of an RTI framework with a particular focus on progress monitoring. The module covers basic information on progress monitoring and a multi-step process for selecting progress monitoring tools. Data-based decision making is embedded throughout the module with content focused on using progress monitoring data to evaluate and make decisions about instruction, to set goals, and to establish an effective progress monitoring system.

In this webinar, Dr. Allison Gandhi, provides an overview of the screening, progress monitoring, and instructional tools charts, describes the information that they provide, and walks through the process that teams can use when selecting an appropriate tool to support RTI implementation.

In this webinar, Dr. Doug Fuchs, Nicholas Hobbs Professor of Special Education and Human Development and Co-Director of Vanderbilt University's Kennedy Center Reading Clinic, presents a summary of his recent article published in Exceptional Children. Dr. Fuchs details the RTI framework and explains the rationale for next generation RTI practices while summarizing the three aspects of Smart RTI and emphasizing the importance and relevance of tertiary prevention.

This document was developed to help parents and other family members understand the essential components of RTI (screening, progress monitoring, multi-level prevention system, and data-based decision making), ask questions about RTI, and understand how the RTI framework may be used to help their children succeed in school.

In this webinar, Dr. Kristen McMaster provides an overview of Curriculum-Based Measurement (CBM) and discusses how CBM data can be used at the secondary level to monitor student progress. She discusses the purpose of CBM, provides a brief description of the research, and demonstrates how CBM data can be used to monitor student progress. She reviews CBM tools that are available for high schools in reading, mathematics, and the content areas, and provides instructions for developing CBM tools for use at the high school level. Following Dr. McMaster's presentation, representatives from Walla Walla High School in Walla Walla, Washington discuss how they have monitored school progress as part of their tiered intervention model.

This training module describes the difference between RTI and traditional assessment for learning disabilities, the basics of RTI using a three-tier model, and instructional interventions within each tier. The module also discusses progress monitoring, the basics of curriculum based measurement (CBM), and using progress monitoring data to make decisions within an RTI framework.

This brief provides an overview of Curriculum-Based Measurement (CBM). It explains how CBM, which provides current, week-by-week information on the progress children are making, can be helpful to parents.